Spring Training Game 21: Yankees at Pirates

By: Gavin Ewbank | Lead Writer

Assuming the rain doesn't ruin the field of play, the Yankees will travel to Bradenton today to face the Pittsburgh Pirates in a 1:05pm ET matchup at McKechnie Field.

Hiroki Kuroda will be on the mound for the Yankees making his fourth start of the spring. After two very good showings in his first couple of starts, Kuroda was far from impressive, getting hit hard by the Detroit Tigers. He gave up four runs in the first inning of the game.

His control was one of the biggest problems. He was leaving a lot of pitches up in the zone during the first inning, giving up a lot of hard hits. He gave up a total of six runs on 10 hits in 3.1 innings.

As you would expect, the terrible outing caused many to worry that Kuroda might be doomed for a bad year after the way he finished last season, but realistically, it's spring training, and the only pitching performances that should matter are the ones in the regular season.

As long as Kuroda can stick to having better control today, and keep the ball down, he should have a lot more success against today's Pirates squad.

Today's lineup vs Pittsburgh:

Today's lineup vs PIT: Nunez 5, Roberts 4, Teixeira 3, McCann 2, Almonte 7, Romine DH, Solarte 6, Garcia 9, Richardson 8, Kuroda RHP.
— Gavin Ewbank (@GavinEwbank) March 17, 2014

Jacoby Ellsbury was scratched from yesterday's lineup with some tightness in his right calf, though no one believes it to be serious. Ellsbury was hoping to be back in the lineup tomorrow when the Yankees host the Boston Red Sox in Tampa, but it looks like Joe Girardi doesn't expect him to play tomorrow, either.

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